


picture me in the weeds (before i learned civility)

by fraldarian



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Canon Compliant, Coming Out, F/F, Gender Identity, Post-Time Skip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:09:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26797885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fraldarian/pseuds/fraldarian
Summary: you can follow me on twitter @fraldarian for more! ingrid is pictured as a he/him lesbian in this fic.
Relationships: Annette Fantine Dominic/Ingrid Brandl Galatea
Comments: 8
Kudos: 33





	picture me in the weeds (before i learned civility)

**Author's Note:**

> you can follow me on twitter @fraldarian for more! ingrid is pictured as a he/him lesbian in this fic.

When the war begins, Ingrid cuts her hair.

It’s meant to be for practicality, not a sense of freedom. But it feels like that, even as she watches Felix exchange his own locks for steel swords and lethal blows. His reasoning is deeper, she knows that much is true; Dimitri had told him he looked more like Glenn each passing day, and an already heavy heart did not need to be burdened by the looks of a dead boy and a betrothed brother.

They’ve all changed. Sylvain exchanges nights spent with the bodies of strangers for something more familiar, and Dimitri succumbs to his ghosts. Felix looks none of them in the eye, and Ingrid sheds the last remnants of frocks and ribbons for cold armour.

It shouldn’t feel right. But it does. Breeches and boots and golden hair that’s shorter than even Sylvain’s tousled strands. Another girl’s hand clasped in hers, and even though Ingrid doesn’t know where they’re going or if they’ll ever make it out alive, it feels like home. Like she’s found herself.

She’s laying in the pasture with Annette, when the truth is set free.

Ingrid isn’t sure when they ever became more than friends. She thinks it was when they reunited, when Annette ran fingers through her hair and told her that it was still as soft as _before._ Before the war, before broken promises and severed ties, and before she’d learnt what it meant to feel like someone she wasn’t.

In truth, it could have been long before that.

It could have been when Annette kissed her at the ball five years ago, when she put her hands to Ingrid’s cheeks and told her she was handsome. It could have been when Ingrid first saw her dancer’s attire and wished _she_ was the one who could adorn Annette in gleaming tassels. It could have been a number of instances, looking back on it.

What matters now is Annette’s hand running down the flank of Ingrid’s Pegasus, while an apple rests in her open palm. The animal bows its head to grasp the apple between its teeth. “I think Noodle is growing soft. Do you remember when she wouldn’t even let me touch her?”

Ingrid smiles. “That’s because she’s my girl.”

Annette rolls over, eyes lidded and framed by ginger lashes. “That means you have two girls.” It’s said with such simplicity, such nonchalant in her voice that it makes Ingrid’s heart squeeze.

“Yeah,” she opts to say, “it does.”

She’s not used to this. Not used to being so openly affectionate, and she definitely isn’t used to it being returned. What she’s used to is cleaning up the messes of others and shying away from the stereotypical behaviour that makes up Faerghus’ ideals of a woman. Annette doesn’t seem to mind any of that, and something about that makes Ingrid fall more in love with every passing day.

“You’re thinking again.” Annette’s voice cuts through her thoughts, as it often does. Whether it be in the shape of her singing, or her shouts, or even the way she laughs at Felix and Sylvain’s antics. “Tell me what’s on your mind, Ingy.”

Ingrid purses her lips, unsure as to what she should say. “I’m thinking,” she says slowly, “about you.” Something about the admission makes her blush, even more so than the nickname Annette so freely uses.

“That’s not anything new.” Draping an arm around Ingrid’s waist, Annette plays with the fraying seams of her girlfriend’s shirt.

A little noise of desperation makes its way up from Ingrid’s throat. “I’m thinking about … how accepting you are. You don’t care about how I act or what I do or how I look.” Bunching her brows together, Ingrid looks away. “Why is that, Annette?”

She must have said something absolutely inane, because suddenly Annette’s head is rising with a newfound energy. “What do you mean, ‘why is that’?”

“What I mean,” Ingrid weakly explains, “is that I don’t feel like I’m a woman.”

The admission is spoken soft, haltingly, as if she’s terrified. And she is. She is terrified, she’s _mortified,_ and Ingrid isn’t sure anymore whether she should have said such a thing or not.

Annette is silent for a long time. But when she speaks, it’s without anger, and Ingrid can’t detect any respite within her voice. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Ingrid makes a noise that borders somewhere between frustration and uncertainty. “I don’t know.” And then, “I feel like I’ve never connected to the Faerghus ideals of womanhood. I feel like it alienates me.” She still can’t look Annette in the eyes. “But I don’t feel like a man either. I don’t know what I feel like, Annette.”

Silence.

When Annette takes Ingrid’s face in her hands, it feels like something out of one of Ashe’s fairy tales. Running a smooth thumb over a porcelain cheek, Annie smiles, and it reminds Ingrid of the setting sun. “Sometimes these things don’t ever have a name to them. Sometimes we just have to accept them for what they are.” She leans forward, captures Ingrid’s lips against hers, and sighs airily. “Whatever you believe, I’ll love you regardless.”

It feels like too much. Ingrid isn’t sure how she’d gotten so lucky. Taking Annette’s hand in hers, she smooths a thumb over knuckles. “Can I admit something to you?”

“Of course.”

“I’ve thought about it. Of being addressed as _him._ ”

“And do you like it?”

Ingrid doesn’t like it – she loves it. Loves it more than words can express, loves the elation that comes with _his_ and _he_ and _handsome_ and _dashing_. Loves how it tastes upon her tongue, like sweet summer tea or the cool winter breeze. She takes a breath, closes her eyes. “I love it, Annette.”

When she opens her eyes again, it’s to a familiar gaze and a smile that seeps into her bones. Warm, and soft, and wholly Annette. “Should I call you by that?”

“Yes,” Ingrid whispers. She takes her girlfriend’s hands between her own, resembling the motion of a prayer. “Please, Annette.”

Her words are better than any sonnet that could have been blessed upon Ingrid. “I love my girlfriend,” Annette murmurs, “I think he’s brave.” A pair of lips kisses between Ingrid’s eyes. “I think he’s strong, and kind. I think he’s a great food critic,” this earns a giggle from Annette at her own words, “and I love it when he eats whatever I bake. It makes me happy.”

Ingrid laughs, and this time, it’s without worry. It’s open, and cheerful, and drips like saturated sunlight. “You lay it on quite thick, Annette.”

“My chevalier deserves only the best.”

And for once, Ingrid thinks he agrees. Smiling, he reaches up to greet Annette’s lips once more.


End file.
